


𝐌𝐄𝐓𝐀𝐍𝐎𝐈𝐀: 𝐚 𝐥𝐢𝐟𝐞𝐭𝐢𝐦𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐞

by hey there sunshine -- (thatsquite_punwise_ofyou)



Category: Wanderlust (RP)
Genre: Gen, Multi, Other, how raphael got to iagos, iggy deserves to be a merman, it's literally so bad, smh we love a backstory, watch me delete this in like a week
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-27
Updated: 2020-05-27
Packaged: 2021-03-02 18:54:00
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24401632
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thatsquite_punwise_ofyou/pseuds/hey%20there%20sunshine%20--
Summary: Coral skies and azure seas are one man's journey from Raphael to Iagos.
Relationships: Iagos Roravelle & Halcyon Wisteria, Lyrea & Keltic Roravelle
Kudos: 1





	𝐌𝐄𝐓𝐀𝐍𝐎𝐈𝐀: 𝐚 𝐥𝐢𝐟𝐞𝐭𝐢𝐦𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐞

Raphael is a perfect example of his kind: playful, curious, and – more than anything – innocent. Unaware of the world and people and ulterior things. For him, life is simple and nothing more than the tugging currents carving patterns in the soft sand that gives way to just about anything. Life is floating along the currents given, cradled by Seidopon. Nothing more than what’s given.

And his mother, too.

Raphael never knew his father. Such is the way of the fleeting lives led by his kind, Seidopon’s people who have no name. Whenever he asks about his father, Lyrea tells him that Raphael’s father stayed with her long enough to nurture her into motherhood. Shortly before Raphael was born, he left. This is commonplace, Raphael is told. He shouldn’t think much of it. But he does anyway.

Every now and then, Raphael wonders what his father must’ve been like. He wonders if they look anything alike. He wonders what his mother was like all that time ago.

Whenever he wonders, Lyrea tells him to stop. So Raphie forgets it quickly and moves on just as quickly- his thoughts shifting as readily as the sea’s waves.

Life is lived day by day. Raphael and Lyrea sleep in a cave they share with some marine critters that Raphie never had the patience to become familiar with beyond recognising the colony of bioluminescence in one corner of the cave, or the waving fingers of seagrass in another.

He wakes up when the water outside is lit by glowing beams. Raphael once asked Lyrea where the glowing pillar things come from. She told him that they came from a great orb hanging in the sky above the water. She called it the Sun.

Raphael didn’t believe her at the time, so Lyrea took him up to the surface. Raphael was unusually curious, even for a creature of his kind, but the world above never appealed to his inquisitiveness. After all, where was the fun in fussing over a realm completely irrelevant to his own life when he could instead enjoy the water pressing on him from all sides, like an ever-present hug? As Raphael understood it, there was no such pressure above the water- and no water! The disgust outweighed any novelty.

Despite his chagrin, Lyrea took him up anyway. Raphael still remembers the way his aversion turned around in an instant. He still remembers the moment his head broke the surface, and he took his very first breath of air. It was strange, taking oxygen in this method when usually all he had to do was let the water run through the gills around the backs of his ears.

But even though it was definitely the weirdest thing Raphael had ever done, the air-breathing was... almost pleasant. He remembers looking over to Lyrea to ask a question, but it was quickly forgotten when he didn’t see her head anywhere. Raphie sank back down to find Lyrea hovering in place just below the surface.

He opened his mouth, probably to ask why she wasn’t going up with him, but Raphael forgot the question a moment later as Lyrea pointed out the legendary Sun. Raphael remembers how its image was distorted by the churning water.

Interested in what the Sun would look like directly, Raphael went to go above the water again-  
  
Something new takes Raphie’s attention and pulls him away from his fleeting recollections as easily as meat pulled from the bones of a decaying carcass, like the ones that sometimes drift down to the ocean floor.

_What in Seidopon’s name is that?_ Raphael wonders as he swims closer. It looks like some kind of whale, he thinks. But what kind of whale, even rotten, has skin like that? It looks like it’s made of one of the drifting scraps that Raphael sometimes sees bobbing along the surface. Lyrea called it ‘driftwood’ one time.

He swims closer, urged on by his insatiable hunger for discovery.

The driftwood-whale thing doesn’t move. It looks like it hasn’t moved in a long time; there are barnacles and algae sticking all over it. Raphael wonders what it could be- then remembers that he already wondered that. He swims closer and closer still.

A few local fish swarm him in greeting. Raphael wishes he could understand fish talk like Lyrea can. He starts to wonder why she’s able to and not himself-

Oh, what is _that_? Raphael finds what looks like the front of the strange creature. He sees a series of off symbols engraved in the thing’s crusty skin, but if they have any meaning, Raphael isn’t able to discern it. Next to the symbols gapes a maw that looks like it’ll allow him access to the creature’s innards. But, odd enough, there isn’t anything that remotely resembles the insides of any marine creature, whale or otherwise.

His swimming slows a little, caution putting a restraint on Raphie’s curiosity.

He’s surrounded by all kinds of oddities, things he’s never seen before. Knickknacks that look like they used to be shinier than the brightest of fish scales, but have since been blanketed by moss and algae like almost everything else that belongs to the ocean... and yet, it becomes increasingly obvious that this _thing_ does not belong in the ocean.

Raphael tentatively calls out with a sharp click from the front of his mouth. He doesn’t feel any change in the water; the hollow whale-shaped _thing_ seems to be empty, apart from the barnacles kissing its sides and a few other critters Raphie pays little mind.

He swims over to... something. It resembles the shelves of a reef, but instead of being crammed with life, the not-shelf is stocked with a few creatures that remind him of oysters. Raphael opens one. To his surprise, he hardly has to pry; the not-oyster opens almost willingly.

Raphael spends a moment poking the soft thing that he thinks must be a shell (but he isn’t sure), and its soggy innards float up through the water. Raphael retracts his and, tired of the strange oyster; its novelty has worn off, and he is bored of it.

It takes even less effort for him to push through the water than it did to open the not-oyster. Raphael traverses this dim, strange place. The lack of light doesn’t bother Raphael; his eyes adjust readily to the limited light. Lyrea says that their kind has natural night vision, though Raphael has difficulty seeing at night, so maybe that’s an exaggeration.

But that doesn’t really matter. Raphael continues poking around the driftwood carcass.

He finds all kinds of alien things that he doesn’t even know how to describe. All he knows is that he’s never seen them before. Raphael tried asking some of them where they came from, but to his disgust, none of the objects seemed to be alive and therefore could give no answer. Oh, or maybe it was because he didn’t understand fish talk like Lyrea claimed _she_ did-

Oh, Lyrea! Maybe she’d know what some of these things are. Raphael’s logic tells him that since Lyrea’s been around much longer than him, she would surely know of these strange things.

Raphael is quite young for his kind, only about twenty or thirty- he isn’t sure, and really, who’s keeping count? Lyrea is middle-aged, about a hundred. She tells Raphael that he’s still got another two or three decades to go before maturity, but biologically, he’s already moving out of adolescence. So she must be exaggerating again.

But Lyrea’s age isn’t an exaggeration (unless the exaggeration is that she’s older than she looks; Raphael wouldn’t put it past her). So, naturally, she’s the first person he turns to.

He picks up as many of the trinkets as he can fit in his two arms, and starts swimming. Burdened by these, Raphael curses his own shortsightedness; he really ought to carry around a tote or something, just in case of situations like this when he finds something interesting.

Another evidence of Lyrea’s experience is that she’s wise enough to carry around a tote of her own. She calls it ‘cloth’ and says it comes from the surface (a place she seems to know a lot about, Raphael realises, which is all the more reason to ask her about this driftwood whale).

He’s pretty sure he’s halfway home; he recognises this stretch of sand. Raphael’s body moves on its own; his head is full of seafoam, wondering what Lyrea might tell him these baubles are.

The seafoam dissipates. A shadow appears over Raphael’s head.

_What is that?_ he wonders, definitely not for the first time today. Raphael looks up toward the surface and frowns. It’s dark in this little pocket of the ocean, but Raphael can clearly see surrounding areas are bathed in the Sun’s rays. Why is it dark only above Raphael? What’s blocking the Sun?

He swims directly up, something Raphie rarely has reason to do. He pauses just below the waves, though, because he doesn’t see where the water ends and the surface begins. It looks like there is something in the way- but what?

The thing, whatever it is, is moving, too. Raphael follows, swimming just below the bottom of this beast. He thinks he might’ve seen something resembling this befo- ah! Right! The strange driftwood-whale thing he’d picked up all these trinkets from- oh, the trinkets. Raphael looked down at his arms. They were empty. He must’ve dropped them when he saw this other... driftwood thing.

But why is it swimming through the top of the water, on the surface, when the other creature sat on the ocean floor? So many questions!

Raphael pokes around the bottom of the structure, but finds no opening to the inside like there was with the other one. Only slightly nettled, Raphael swims to the side of the driftwood whale. A strangled sort of grunt escapes his lips, a gesture of surprise. Raphie rubs his throat, startled to feel involuntary vibration there. He rarely had use for his voice, since it didn’t carry well in the water except at close range.

His idle thoughts cut short; Raphael sees again what caused his gasp in the first place. In fact, he had forgotten about it so well that he almost gives a second noise of surprise. The driftwood-whale is larger than he thought before, and Raphael decides that ‘vessel’ might be a better term for this thing.

Pushing his limbs hard to keep up with the vessel, Raphael pokes his head through the surf and oxygen enters his body through his mouth and nose.

He hears... voices? Are there _people_ inside this vessel? Perhaps that would explain why this vessel floats while the other sat at the bottom of the sea.

It crosses Raphael’s mind that he should go ask Lyrea for her thoughts on this (like he originally intended on doing, but Raphael had forgotten), but the thought finishes crossing and vanishes. He swims closer.

“Hello?” Raphael calls with no caution.

The voices stop. Something slices through Raphael’s curiosity, something in his chest. He doesn’t like it, so he obliges it in the hope that it’ll disappear, and ducks back under the cover of water. He is a child of the water and it is safe for him here, in Seidopon’s realm. From here, underwater, he can see a few figures vaguely resembling himself or Lyrea, pointing down at the water.

Raphael has never met struggle before. He knows the ways of the ocean. He knows vanity and self-service and following his impulses. He knows pleasure and instant gratification and doesn’t bother with thinking things through too hard.

What he encounters now is something new, though. Raphael doesn’t understand it: having two urges at once, simultaneous but opposing each other. He wants to swim back to the surface and greet those other people. He wants to know about them. But at the same time, he wants to remain here, in the water, where he is protected.

Raphael is confused. He doesn’t know what he wants.

The choice is taken from his hands a moment later, though; by the time Raphie has decided to risk the first option and see what can be gleaned from the figures on the vessel, he realises that the vessel itself has continued on its way... without him.

Another new feeling weighs down his chest: disappointment. Raphael doesn’t like it any more than he liked the indecision plaguing him just a minute ago. Luckily for him, it dissipates some time during the swim back to the cave he calls home.

Raphael clicks his tongue loudly to alert Lyrea to his arrival. She appears before him a moment later.

Lyrea is a fine example of their kind- though Raphael doesn’t have much to compare her to. She is getting on in her age, true, but she is no less voluminous in all her aspects- from her hair to her eyes to her lips to the suppler parts of her body.

Raphael is welcomed home with a soft hug. For a moment, he forgets all about the two vessels he saw today and his intentions to ask Lyrea what she might know of people living above the water. But he remembers in what is basically no time.

“Mother,” he begins to ask, but Lyrea cuts him off with impatience.

“Raphie, please, ‘Mother’ makes me sound like an old seacow,” Lyrea complains as she always does when Raphael makes this mistake. “ _Lyrea_ , silly, _Lyrea_ is my name.” A hand reaches out to ruffle Raphael’s hair.

“Sorry,” Raphael mutters by reflex. It’s what he always says when she makes this protest.

Lyrea waves a hand, and the argument (if you could call this little dispute an argument) is forgotten.

Raphael watches Lyrea tend to a serving of what will be their food for the day, but doesn’t pay enough attention to see what she’s making, other than the algae she’s harvesting from the cave walls.

Something nags at the back of Raphael’s mind. He doesn’t like nags very much; they’re uncomfortable and make him nervous, which is something else he doesn’t like. Unfortunately, the only consistent way to get rid of nags is to address them, so Raphael tries to recall what could cause a nag such as this- oh, yes, his questions!

“Mo- Lyrea,” Raphael begins again. He’s lucky he catches himself before he makes that slip again. “I have a question.” He hesitates, unsure how to phrase his wonderings about the people who breathe air instead of water.

“Yes, child?” Lyrea asks, almost patiently; that’s rare, for her.

“Are there...” Raphael pauses again, to his own discomfort. He forces himself to continue, which he doesn’t like very much either, but his curiosity wins out like it always does. “Are there people who live above the water? In the air?”

Lyrea pauses her food preparation. Raphael isn’t sure why. He starts to wonder, but it begins turning into worry (has he upset her? Is that an offensive question?) so he stops as soon as he can, and dismisses the thought.

“Actually, um, never mind,” he decides with a waving hand. Raphael floats through the water, revolving slowly, head over heels. “It’s not that big of a deal. I just found some big... vessel things. They looked like whales, but they looked like they were made of, um...” He pauses, forgetting the word for a moment. “Driftwood.”

Lyrea resumes motion a moment later, which is good because Raphie had been starting to wonder if she’d turned into stone or something. He thinks he hears her sigh, but it’s difficult to discern such sounds underwater. “Yes, it isn’t a big deal,” she agrees graciously.

And that’s the last of that. Raphael forgets things easily, but he’ll remember the driftwood vessels and the people who breathed air. Even as he eats with Lyrea in silence, even as he settles down on a sandbed for the night, his head is full of not seafoam, but those strange people on the driftwood vessel.


End file.
